Using Google Sites to Share a Digital Slides Escape Room

[@kevincox5961]

You are a wizard!! Love it

[@sandra_i_skolan]

This is a really helpful tutorial. Thank you very much!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Glad it was helpful!

[@jadeenglene]

This makes it looks so pro - thank you!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

I'm so glad! You're welcome!

[@101dancingstar]

Thanks so much for your amazing tutorials!!!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Glad you like them!

[@taleahughes358]

This is amazing content! Much appreciated!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Thanks! Let me know if you have any questions.

[@heathergarton1537]

Very helpful! Thank you so much!!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

You are so welcome!

[@dequankydarakareem]

This is so Cool. Thanks for sharing

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Thanks for watching!

[@paulapenna-loveyourvoice]

Thanks so much for this! I'm just having trouble on sharing the site - my site doesn't have the nice short URL you have. It is just a bunch of letters and numbers in a really long address. When I share that, it brings the student to the backend "editing" page instead of the front "view" screen.

[@jamiegregory4277]

Thanks for sharing! Super easy to follow your instructions. Made mine with no problems. Great way to make everything more streamlined!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Great to hear!

[@danielagomes5029]

Hello! Thank you so much for all your help! How can we make the "clock" start in Google Sites?!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Honestly, I have not had much luck making any clocks auto-start. When using Google Sites, I now usually just include the timer outside the "room slide," with some verbiage about starting the clock before you begin.

[@brendahinschberger7107]

Thank you so much! This is really great! If I wanted to add more than one room (doing a history escape, starting on the boat, then going to a pioneer home then a long house then fur trader station, for example), do you know if there’s a way to have students get the first clue, then complete their form and if they get it right, to open the next “room” with a new door/lock and new clues, answer the next Google form, and then open another room to get to the very end? I understand the if/then on the Google form to switch sections, but not sure where to go from there. Thoughts?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Great question (and it's one I get a lot). I have an answer on my website (www.amandadills.com/escaperooms), but the nutshell answer is that you'll want a separate Google Slides file for EACH room, and you can include the link to Room #2 either in a text field in the next section of your Form, or in the Submission Confirmation information of the form. Hope this helps - and definitely check out the page I linked for a more detailed explanation!

[@brendahinschberger7107]

@@TechieSpaghetti Thank you again! I used all your information and created two escape rooms - one for grade 7 Ontario history and one for grade 4 Rocks & Minerals. They were awesome and the kids loved them! I used the link in the response to connect the “rooms” and it worked great. Thanks for your ideas, and your videos are beautiful and easy to follow. Much appreciated!!!

[@aliart7415]

Hi. When i Insert my slides, I lose the ability to click on the items. I think I'm pasting an image instead of embedding but not sure how to fix that.

[@ryandriver3076]

Thanks so much for your videos, this has made my efforts WAY better! I have a question. I want to create multiple 'rooms' in sites. So once they break out of the first room they can progress to the second. How can you do this? The end of the first room is them opening a padlock, via a google form. what can you recommend as a next step? Thanks!

[@asaolofsson7707]

Try putting the link to the next room as your "confirmation message" (where it usually says smth like "Thanks for answering this quiz") under Settings - Presentation (mine is Swedish, but I suppose it says so in English as well?) in your Google Form. Works for me.

[@TechieSpaghetti]

The suggestion below is exactly what I would recommend - use the confirmation message to lead participants to the next "room page" of your site. Good luck!

[@suedemczyna5622]

This looks awesome! I had never heard of Google Sites. I like that you can add all of your pages/links in one spot. I have created an escape room that is a whole Google Slides presentation with multiple slides and then links off each page. Would this still work? Also, how would I get the timer (which is on page one of the presentation) to get going as the person changes to other slides. Can you share this on Google Meet so that groups can work on it together?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Great questions! The problem with putting all your clues into a slideshow is that it's hard to keep students from hopping from slide to slide, which would let them see all the clues without really "playing" the room. Timers are unfortunately a bit unreliable, but they *should keep going on the original tab when the student opens a new tab. And yes, you should be able to share this on Google Meet. (I know it works great via Zoom.)

[@DiscoveringTheArtofLiving]

@@TechieSpaghetti thanks so much for the great response! I will try it out!!

[@tanyahunter4612]

So, do we need to make the escape room first before making these changes? Thank you, btw!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Not necessarily. If you'd rather design your clues as a Sites page (or using a tool like Canva), go for it!

[@glennreib]

1st of all thank you for these videos.. They are very helpful and really easy to understand. I have a quick question, when using Google Sites how do you set up a page with a question that needs an answer? If they get the question correct can they get a response saying "You are Correct" or if they are incorrect can they get a response to say "So Sorry try again?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

I'm so glad the video is helpful! The short answer is that if you have a question that needs an answer, you will need to set that up in a Google Form. In the form you can use Response Validation tell them Correct or Incorrect. (I suppose you could also build this out with links and unique pages inside of Google Sites, but that's probably a topic for another tutorial.)

[@susanamarin2884]

do you recommend doing the slide in google slides and forms and then move everything to google sites?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

If you don't need to share it out or make copies of the finished escape room, then that is exactly what I recommend, yes. :) It's basically impossible to share or copy a Google Site, so if that is important to you, you may want to keep everything in a single Slides Presentation and use some "hacks" to keep students on the same slide. I don't have a video on this yet, but you can get access to an example here: gum.co/UOzgj (or search for me on Teachers Pay Teachers)

[@susanamarin2884]

@@TechieSpaghetti would I be able to share my version on zoom break up rooms so the students can play with their groups?

[@stacyupton9733]

@@TechieSpaghetti What do you mean it's basically impossible to share a Google site?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

@@stacyupton9733 With Google Slides, I could send you a "template" link that would allow you to easily make a copy of the slideshow onto your own Google Drive, without affecting my copy. With Sites, I can easily share the finished site with someone in read-only view (or allow another user to edit my site), but I have yet to find a good way to allow someone else to copy my site or use it as a template.

[@sararaygor3419]

Hey there. Love this tutorial. Short, sweet, and to the point. I am wondering if Google had an update and changed their url names and such. I am having an issue with creating the link to the clue pages. My home page url doesn't have a "home" name in it, just a bunch of letters and numbers and the same with my clue pages. So I though I could just change the "edit" phrase at the end of my clue page to "view" and then it would take me to the viewable page and not an editable page. That does not work. It's basically a broken link at that point. Any help with this would be amazing. Thanks so much. Smiles!

[@sararaygor3419]

I am sorry. I think I have figured it out. Thanks so much.

[@shannoncaldwell9187]

This helped a lot! My question is, if I want to make a room for math and the kids have to get an exact answer, how do I do that? Is there a way to do it with google slides? That is what my second graders are used to.

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Yes - sort of! To require typing in an exact answer, you will need to incorporate a Google Form (with response validation) into your Escape Room. I go into more detail about this in my other Escape Room tutorial video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oJuunKCImbZrl8U Good luck!

[@hellomail2285]

I’ve been following your tutorial for the escape room. Used google slides for the “rooms”and used google forms for the “locks”, but I’m having a hard time understanding how to link the form to a new part of the escape room once they open it? Can you offer advice? Thanks!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Hmm... it sounds like you're trying to send your participants BACK into the room after they solve the response validation puzzle, yes? If so, you could either put a link in a text box in the form, or by putting it in the "submission complete message" -- or you could just add verbiage that says "go back to your original tab" if you want them to go back to the original room. Hope this helps!

[@beth.brewster]

Hey I have a quick question! How can I get rid of the tool bar at the bottom for the rooms? I don't want them to be able to just click that and swap rooms.

[@TechieSpaghetti]

If you're embedding different "slide" rooms into a Google Site, your easiest option will be creating a separate slides document for each room. There are lots of different hacks you can do inside of the slideshow as well, but by far the easiest option is to just use different Slides, if that's possible. If you still have questions, let me know!

[@katzztheva]

What happens when the time runs out? I don't see any way to stop their access to the room, or start over if they run out of time? anyone?

[@nuggetboop1284]

what is the sharing settings for google form that is inside the google sites? i know in google slides we can change it to copy so students can get a copy and wont be able to access the original slides. how about in google forms?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

In forms, you just grab the "Send" link and paste that into the room. Here's a video that talks about sharing Google Forms: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gafdlouEmbOtfM0. Good luck!

[@iselavalenzuela1030]

How do I avoid them going to the link of the room if they are clicking on items that do not contain a clue?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

In this example, I am only using a 1-slide slideshow, so even if they click elsewhere on the slide, it won't advance them to the next slide.

[@brucesundberg6975]

Do you have the link for the room background you used or a place that has similar ones?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Hi! I have a free resource on Teachers Pay Teachers that includes links to some good, free background images (www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Digital-ClassroomEscape-Room-Image-Collection-Rooms-Furniture-Items-Etc-6011193). I also recommend searching on Pixabay.com for "empty room interior" -- Good luck!

[@msudenverpeermentors5112]

In Google Sites, can you make the clock go automatically?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

That's a great question, and I honestly don't know. Maybe someone else viewing this video knows...

[@andreamillan1190]

Thank you for sharing! I linked my clues to google forms, so now im having the following problem. Students enter the home page. They need to click on something on the embeded slide. They are taken to a google form. After they answer the form, how do I take them back to the site, not to the home page, but to the additional page clue2 i created?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

That's a great question! The students just need to close the tab they're currently on or switch back to their original browser tab. I like to include some verbiage on the form itself like, "Close this tab (or press control-shift-tab) to go back to the escape room to keep looking for clues."

[@korinndavies2320]

Instead of "everyone with the link" do you think this will work if we choose "anyone in your board" ?

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Honestly, I am not familiar with the "anyone in your board" settings, but my hunch is that it would only make things visible to users who are logged in in your organization. If that covers all the people completing the escape room then it should work, but I would still probably recommend doing the "everyone with the link" option if you can.

[@kalynnnortham3681]

Have you ran into any issues with multiple people using the google site at the same time? I have about 50 students that I would like to use my site during the same timeframe and worry I will run into traffic issues. Thank you!

[@TechieSpaghetti]

Great question! Google doesn't list any limits for Sites viewers, but there are a few limits around who can access your Slideshow. It looks like if you want more than 100 people to view the slideshow embedded in the site, you'll need to publish the slideshow to the web. With 50 students, it looks like you *shouldn't* have any issues, though.

[@jeanabyrd2342]

Is there any way to do this without it opening up new tabs.

[@TechieSpaghetti]

With the way I have this set up, I don't believe so (though if you're reading this and you know a way to do it, please reply to this comment!). However, if you were to put the whole presentation in either Google Sites (without using Slides) or in a Slideshow, you could have it open things in the same window. Comment below if you have any specific questions or use cases! :)

[@pamelawaller5445]

Help i need much help creating an escape room. Can we talk